In a booklet called Catechism of Mental Prayer (a basic Baltimore Catechism style Q&A on mental prayer), the author (Fr. Joseph Simler) asks the question, “Has the religious who is devoted to an active life any special reason for applying himself to mental prayer”. Fr. Simler answers yes, with one of his reasons being that “Because Our Lord, Who came on earth to save mankind, devoted far more time to prayer than to preaching.”

Not being opposed to the thought (in fact I’m definitely partial to the idea), I nonetheless wonder on what basis Fr. Simler states such. Certainly we see our Lord retreating to the mountains for prayer, stating that the interior life is the one thing necessary, praying from the cross, etc. Nonetheless, do we not actually read Him preaching more times than praying?

Now here It is clear that before the sin of man earth produced nothing harmful – no poisonous plant, no unfruitful tree. Since it is plainly said that every plant and all trees were given to men and to birds and to all the living creatures of the earth for food, it is clear that those birds did not live by stealing the food of weaker animals, nor did the wolf search out an ambush around the sheepfold, nor was the dust the serpent’s food, but all things in harmony feed upon the green plants and the fruits of the trees.

As a spineless Balthasarian worshiper of the Hegelian Kirkengeist it is natural that Ouellet (like his Germanic twin Schönborn) should betray those fighting for the truth of the faith against the corrupt men who have taken possession of the Roman Curia. For them there is no untainted Gospel preached by the apostles from the beginning never to be believed differently, never to be understood in any other way. Instead, there is the self-realisation of “the God who is history” (in Kasper’s words) through the institution of the Church (which, for them, replaces the role played by the Prussian state for Hegel). This allows them to change their beliefs to suit the needs of ecclesiastical advancement without scruple. This allows Ouellet to call the criticism of the pope blasphemy and insinuate that Viganò is not in communion with the See of Rome because he has had the temerity to expose the immoral acts of its bishop.

On the purely tactical level his strategy is to scream insults as Viganò while conceding his central allegation to avoid the difficulty that Viganò is telling the truth.

“Now they (adults) are disposed unto the said justice, when, excited and assisted by divine grace, conceiving faith by hearing, they are freely moved towards God, believing those things to be true which God has revealed and promised, – and this especially, that God justifies the impious by His grace, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus”

– Council of Trent, Decree on Justification

“If anyone says that divine faith is not to be distinguished from natural knowledge about God and moral matters, and consequently that for divine faith it is not required that revealed truth should be believed because of the authority of God who reveals it: let him be anathema.”

– First Vatican Council, Dei Filius

A system of morality based exclusively on human reason robs man of his highest dignity and lowers him from the supernatural to the merely natural life. Not but that man is able by the right use of reason to know and to obey certain principles of the natural law. But though he should know them all and keep them inviolate through life-and even this is impossible without the aid of the grace of our Redeemer-still it is vain for anyone without faith to promise himself eternal salvation. ‘If anyone abide not in Me, he shall be cast forth as a branch, and shall wither, and they shall gather him up and cast him into the fire, and he burneth’ (John XV., 6). ‘He that believeth not shall be condemned’ (Mark XVI., 16).

– Leo XIII, Tametsi Futura Prospicientibus

“We declare that the greater number of those who are condemned to eternal punishment suffer that everlasting calamity because of ignorance of those mysteries of faith which must be known and believed in order to be numbered among the elect.”

“[T]he principle of the separation of the State and Church … is equivalent to the separation of human legislation from Christian and divine legislation. We do not care to interrupt Ourselves here in order to demonstrate the absurdity of such a separation; each one will understand for himself. As soon as the State refuses to give to God what belongs to God, by a necessary consequence it refuses to give to citizens that to which, as men, they have a right; as, whether agreeable or not to accept, it cannot be denied that man’s rights spring from his duty toward God. Whence if follows that the State, by missing in this connection the principal object of its institution, finally becomes false to itself by denying that which is the reason of its own existence. These superior truths are so clearly proclaimed by the voice of even natural reason, that they force themselves upon all who are not blinded by the violence of passion; therefore Catholics cannot be too careful in defending themselves against such a separation.”